Ireland voted against the Lisbon Treaty last year. And as you also probably know, Ireland is as a result holding another referendum on the Treaty in October because we peasants can't be allowed to obstruct the important business of the EU.

Today the Campaign Against the Eu Constitution, now mostly trading as SayNo.ie held a press conference and later on a public meeting. CAEUC is the main anti-Lisbon campaign, composed of the Left, Republican and Peace Movement groups who oppose Lisbon. The press conference got a lot of media coverage and the large public meeting was of interest to spotters.

The public meeting took place in Liberty Hall, the headquarters of the biggest trade union SIPTU (SIPTU are not part of the campaign and haven't yet decide what way to call for a vote). The platform consisted of Jimmy Kelly, the Irish regional secretary of the UNITE union (the second largest union in Ireland, part of the British based UNITE union), Mary Lou McDonald, the Vice President of Sinn Fein, Bob Crow, the General Secretary of the British based RMT union and Joe Higgins, Socialist Party MEP. Brid Smith of People Before Profit (and the SWP) chaired the meeting.

The general tone of the platform speeches was very left wing, particularly Joe Higgins and Bob Crow. The latter explained the RMT's history in Ireland in passing, explaining that the old National Union of Railwaymen organised in Ireland but withdrew in 1954, handing over their membership, their offices and £50,000 (equivalent to over a million now) to the Irish trade unions on the grounds that they no longer thought that British unions should organise in Ireland. When the RMT was formed through a merger with the seamen's union however they inherited three branches on the island of Ireland which didn't want to leave the union. Crow declared that he was there to call for a workers Europe in a workers world and to oppose capitalism, which to put it mildly isn't the usual speech you hear from union leaders in Liberty Hall.